Photos: Augmented reality served up with Wimbledon tennis

The Wimbledon Championships kicks off next week and the tennis tournament's technology partner IBM has been showing off some of the technology that will play a part in the fortnight-long competition.

IBM's Seer app for Android and iPhone devices is aimed at helping vistors find their way around the All England club and keeping them up to date with developments during their time at the Championships.

Shown above is the points of interest menu of the Seer application running on a Google Nexus One device.

Users can select which points of interest - including courts, food outlets, gates, landmarks, information points and transport - that they want to see on a map (shown overleaf) or on the augmented reality display.

Photo credit: Tim Ferguson/silicon.com

Published: June 15, 2010 -- 14:50 GMT (07:50 PDT)

Caption by: Tim Ferguson

Displayed on the screen here are the courts (green), food outlets (orange) and gates (red) overlaid on a map of the Wimbledon All England Lawn Tennis Club, where the Championships are held.

Photo credit: Tim Ferguson/silicon.com

Published: June 15, 2010 -- 14:50 GMT (07:50 PDT)

Caption by: Tim Ferguson

Pictured above is the augmented reality part of the IBM Seer application.

The application uses GPS to work out the user's location then overlays icons into the phone's camera display to show which courts and food outlets are nearby.

The application can be adjusted to show points of interest at different distances away from where the user is situated.

The circular image on the bottom right shows which way the user is facing and the distance to points of interest.

Photo credit: Tim Ferguson/silicon.com

Published: June 15, 2010 -- 14:50 GMT (07:50 PDT)

Caption by: Tim Ferguson

Using the Seer app's directory menu, users can get more detailed information about each point of interest.

During match days, for example, the scores for each game are shown in real time using data drawn from the IBM scoring system.

With individuals employed to record each statistic from every point played from courtside, data from the matches is passed on to IBM to create data feeds and graphics that are used by the television commentators to show how matches are developing.

Photo credit: Tim Ferguson/silicon.com

Published: June 15, 2010 -- 14:50 GMT (07:50 PDT)

Caption by: Tim Ferguson

As well as allowing tennis fans to listen to Radio Wimbledon, IBM Seer also connects to users' Twitter account so they can let their followers know how the strawberries and Pimms are going down from within the app.

IBM Scouts around the site will also be tweeting to say what they've seen around the tournament, so if Rafael Nadal is signing autographs on Henman Hill, Seer users using the Twitter element will be among the first to know.

Photo credit: Tim Ferguson/silicon.com

Published: June 15, 2010 -- 14:50 GMT (07:50 PDT)

Caption by: Tim Ferguson

Once the Championships get going, users will also be able to access live video streams of the matches on the three show courts - Centre Court (shown above), Court One and Court Two.

The television streams will be encoded by IBM and fed out to the application.

In order to make the video streaming as high quality as possible, a network of 3G picocells supplied by Vodafone will be set up by IBM to cater for the large number of people using the service.

IBM is also using variable bit rate technology to help streams continue if network strength drops.

Photo credit: Tim Ferguson/silicon.com

Published: June 15, 2010 -- 14:50 GMT (07:50 PDT)

Caption by: Tim Ferguson

Pictured here are a couple of the courts between Centre Court and Court One. To the right is the media centre where TV coverage will be based during the Championships.

Underneath the courts lies IBM's technology control centre - where the data coming from the courts is processed, the tournament's networks are controlled and its website is managed.

Photo credit: Tim Ferguson/silicon.com

Published: June 15, 2010 -- 14:50 GMT (07:50 PDT)

Caption by: Tim Ferguson

Shown here is part of the technology control centre known as the ops centre, where match data is collected and redistributed.

The IBM team recently arrived from working at the French Open at Roland Garros in Paris and is still in the process of unpacking gear.

Photo credit: Tim Ferguson/silicon.com

Published: June 15, 2010 -- 14:50 GMT (07:50 PDT)

Caption by: Tim Ferguson

This is some of the tech kit that the IBM team transports between the major tennis events. These servers were used at the French Open just a few weeks ago.

Photo credit: Tim Ferguson/silicon.com

Published: June 15, 2010 -- 14:50 GMT (07:50 PDT)

Caption by: Tim Ferguson

Another office is home to the team responsible for running the Wimbledon.org website which is updated during the tournament with live match scores and news.

The website editorial team uses IBM's Websphere content management system to update the website with news and images.

The screens above show the live scores from the Wimbledon qualifying tournament at nearby Roehampton which takes place during the week prior to the start of the main draw.

The Wimbledon Championships kicks off next week and the tennis tournament's technology partner IBM has been showing off some of the technology that will play a part in the fortnight-long competition.

IBM's Seer app for Android and iPhone devices is aimed at helping vistors find their way around the All England club and keeping them up to date with developments during their time at the Championships.

Shown above is the points of interest menu of the Seer application running on a Google Nexus One device.

Users can select which points of interest - including courts, food outlets, gates, landmarks, information points and transport - that they want to see on a map (shown overleaf) or on the augmented reality display.